B&B families prefer Croydon to Walsall

B&B families prefer Croydon to Walsall

Croydon Council has offered 29 families a house in Walsall – and they have all refused

Croydon Council has offered 29 families a house in Walsall – and they have all refused.

Even cash sweeteners will not change their minds.

The Tory council is desperate to cut its £300,000-a-month bill for temporary accommodation and wants homeless families to move out.

But Walsall has been branded “the world’s ugliest town” and unemployment is high. Attempts to get people in B&Bs in the south London borough to go to Hull, dubbed “the UK’s crappiest town”, have also failed.

Author Theodore Dalrymple, 62, has written: “It is possible that there are uglier towns in the world than Walsall, but if so I do not know them.”

Hull was judged the worst place of all in a book called Crap Towns.

Croydon local Tom Spence, 32, said: “Why would someone living in London want to relocate to Walsall?

“As far as I can tell it’s pretty bleak up there.”

Croydon Council housing chief Dudley Mead had admitted: “If a family is to volunteer to move away from Croydon, there at least has to be employment opportunities.”